


Revelations

by jenna_thorn



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-09
Updated: 2004-09-09
Packaged: 2018-07-28 17:59:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7650919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenna_thorn/pseuds/jenna_thorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A traveler comes to LA</p>
            </blockquote>





	Revelations

"You guys are back awful quick. Please don't tell me this was for nothing. Wasn't it there?" Cordelia's voice rose from where she was hidden from view by the couch back. She brushed Wesley's solicitous hand aside and continued "Where's Angel?"

"He is laying a false backtrail to confuse the Drmmant should it try to track us."

"It's still alive?"

"We chose a strategic retreat."

"No, we ran the fuck away. And I for one am not going back without big guns. Maybe a flamethrower." Gunn returned his attention to the weapons cabinet. "Cordy, you should have seen this thing, it was…oh yeah. You, uh, want some more aspirin?"

Wesley ignored the interruption, "Nonsense, it is susceptible to something, and we must simply determine what its weaknesses are." He paused. "And hope it doesn't choose to hunt again until we find them."

"Hey, you hit the books and I'll decide just how many of these I can safely carry. Then add one more. Man, that thing was big."

"Lucky for us it's not intelligent." Wesley commented.

"If it isn't intelligent, then why's Angel out there laying trails?" Cordelia settled the largest bag of frozen peas Wesley had ever seen over her forehead.

"Superior senses do not indicate superior intelligence." Wesley shot back. 

 

"Which is why Angel keeps us around, right, English?" Gunn snickered, and even Cordelia smiled. Wes just shot them both a dirty look and traded out books. 

 

"You know, though" Gunn continued, "I never realized how much of this shit was going on right around me. Yeah, sure the vamps, but they seem, almost normal next to some of the stuff you guys take on. And L.A.'s not even special, not like where y'all came from."

 

"True, Sunnydale's a Hellmouth, but every city will draw a population along with the, er, population. Um, what I mean to say is that, well… " 

 

"Every city? You mean this goes on everywhere? Shit."

 

"Predators hunt. They go where their prey is. We hunt the predators. Be glad it's not someplace like Tibet, or Antarctica, or Chicago. And my peas are thawing and you two are yammering and I'm going to go lie down upstairs. Wake me up if you leave. When you leave. Go save the world or something."

 

**

 

Detective Kate Lockley stepped under the yellow tape with a face set in such forbidding lines that the uniform assigned to the perimeter couldn't work up the nerve to ask for her i.d. Unfortunately, that meant that she ran into Detective Bruce Prescott without either of them having enough warning to school themselves into less than open hostilities. He brushed off her half hearted attempt to explain that she was in the neighborhood brusquely.

 

"Doesn't matter anyway. It's my case and there's nothing here for you. Fucked sicko decides to off his girlfriend and shoot her kid. No ghosts, no monsters, nothing that hides under the bed. We got a neighbor identified him, says the vic had a restraining order but this wasn't the first time he'd come back, yelling and screaming and pissing the super off."

 

The fact that this was the third homicide in this building, on this floor, was probably coincidence. She'd pretty much talked herself into leaving when Prescott had to get a final shot in. "Hey, Scully, since all we have here is normals, why don't you go help the Boston PD find their Priest Stalker? You being the monster hunter and all." 

 

"Don't be stupid. The media's played it up, but those are random killings. Only two of the victims were priests and they were probably all victims of opportunity since one of the largest cathedrals in the region is within the killer's territory…" and she looked into the smirk on Prescott's face and the wide eyed gawking of the rookie he's breaking in and realized she'd been had; he'd seen the coincidence, knew she'd show, predicted just how he was going to yank her chain and she'd followed blindly along for the amusement of all. She whirled on her heel and left, a muttered "fuck you" not hiding the fact that this was, in fact, a retreat.

 

**

One short nap and an almost complete pedicure later, a trio of goo covered but triumphant demon hunters returned carrying a collection of swords, books and one somewhat mangled rosemary plant, which was plopped, unceremoniously, on her desk, far too close to her toes. She shoved it toward the computer muttering dire warnings to anyone who even thought about sitting on anything upholstered before changing clothes. "And what is this? Do I look like Martha Stewart? I thought we'd decided to go with silk plants from now on?"

 

"We needed it for the Drmmant and now it's a present for you. I suppose you could cook with it," Wesley replied, studiously ignoring Angels' frantic gesturing, "since we have so many bags of frozen vegetables in stock."

 

"Hey, they're twice the size and half the price of the refreezable ice packs. I'm being budget conscious. Besides, you're going to need one on that cheek, and if you insult me, I won't go get it for you." She rose, surprisingly graceful for someone with toilet paper shoved between her toes. "Am I getting anything else?"

 

Angel shrugged off his coat and it landed with a wet plop. "Please get the first aid kit with the sutures. Gunn, hold still, that's deeper than it looked in the truck."

 

Cordelia shook her head and sighed. "Two toes undone and I get to stitch up people before I can finish. Bleah. Wesley, just for insulting my veggies, you are getting a bag of corn. It's big enough for that bruise and besides, it'll go with the rosemary. So there."

 

**

 

"Please tell me we have more of the disposable cleaning cloths. I've checked the bathroom and that package is empty." Cordy grabbed his wrist to keep him from banging the cabinet door and dragged him to the "everything-we-need-on-a-near-daily-basis storage" room behind the lobby desk. 

 

Gunn looked up from where he was bluing something that had once had a century's worth of patina and now had a cold shine. "You know man, if you'd just call them babybutt wipes, you'd save syllables and we'd even know what you were talking about."

 

"I swear the woman at Costco thinks I run a daycare for the clumsiest children in the state. You know what I bought last time there? Two boxes of diaper wipes, bandages, medical tape, rubbing alcohol, another bag of frozen peas, and those frozen eggrolls that keep disappearing even though no one admits to eating them. She's gonna call the CPS on me, I just know it." She pried the box flap open and handed Wesley a pair of plastic tubs. "There, one for the bathroom and one for your very own. Mazeltov."

 

Gunn mouthed "Mazeltov?" at Wesley as he passed. "As delighted as I am that our research has introduced you to new cultures, we've not run across any dybbuks…"

 

"Which doesn't mean we won't. Besides, hello, dealt with the whole cross cultural thing before. Remember the Rosenberg's? Not that, you know, I ever did the menorah dance or anything, but hey, I know it exists. Or whatever." Deciding on In Style over Cosmo, she slapped the magazine into her purse and started strapping on the gorgeous but incredibly uncomfortable sandals she'd kicked off moments after entering the hotel that morning. 

 

"… and if we did, I'd certainly allow a specialist to handle it. Some faiths still accept their history in the light of the modern world and in fact, one of the leading scholars in Judaic Demonology happens to …"

 

"We've got company." Warned by the shadow across the glass, Gunn was able to drop the halberd and slide it under the couch before Kate, flanked by two uniforms, entered. 

 

"Well, if it isn't the Wick…"

 

"Good afternoon Detective Lockley." Wesley drew Kate's attention, leaving the uniforms to gawk and snicker, respectively, at Cordelia's greeting. 

 

"Good, I'm glad you are here." At his raised eyebrow, she continued." I don't want to deal with your boss and you are the brains of this operation anyway." The sideways glance she threw at Cordelia was so quick that only those who were watching caught it. Everyone in the room was watching, but it was at least an attempt at subtlety. She snarled "Give us a minute," and motioned for the two policemen to stay in the lobby while she pulled Wesley into his office. The abandoned policemen looked at one another, then around, trying to reconcile the current setting with the exotic crimes specialist they'd been expecting. Cordelia, with seven million straps finally fastened, announced she was getting lunch and as the door swung shut behind her, Gunn decided that he was not compelled to be polite and with a wicked smile resumed rubbing down the halbard, noting with some justifiable delight that he had the full attention of two very nervous members of the force.

 

***

 

"I've got a serial killer and it's one of yours." 

 

"Ah, yes then." Wesley realized he had a babywipe package in each hand and books in the only possible chair. He hurriedly stacked all of them on a corner of his desk and sat, attempting to look professorial, or, failing that, anything but bewildered. "And you have come to this conclusion because…?"

 

"Random victims, not all human, staged sites " ignoring the chair, Kate continued to pace. "It's as though there should be a pattern, but there isn't." she toyed with the box absently before realizing what she held. "No kids." She mused briefly stroking the cherubic face laughing up at her under Kirkland's Best Logo. "not yet, anyway. But we can't figure him out. Maybe it'll be kids next. Shit…."

 

"Obviously he's killed a policeman, or you wouldn't have an armed guard, obviously there were, ahem, unusual circumstances, or you wouldn't have come to me… I can deduce a good bit of your dilemma, but I do believe it would be more efficient for you to tell me what I am supposed to help you with. You said 'not all human', yes? What are the characteristics of the, urm, other parts?"

 

She tossed a bulky manila envelope at him. "A bunch of horses, once at a zoo. It's here, all of it. I'll courier over copies of any new information." Wesley opened the oversized envelope to see a stack of photocopies somewhat haphazardly organized. 

 

"I meant anything unusual. Honestly, zoo animals aren't our…"

 

"Look, it's creepy. And you specialize in creepy. Nothing's eaten or drained of blood or obviously sacrificed but there's clearly a ritual element. There have been 6 sites and thirty humans dead and I need your help to stop whatever creepy evil thing is doing this to humans." She opened the door. "Look at the file. Just tell me what I'm looking for. Whether it's green and scaly or if it hides behind a mask like Angel's. I'll call you if there's another site. You've got my number." She spun into the lobby proper, past a still smirking Gunn, glared at the two uniforms and stormed out with them on her heels. 

 

Angel leaned over the second floor railing and asked, "so we have a case?" Wesley waved him down and strode across to the large counter pulling sheets out of the envelope as he walked. 

* * *

 

Wesley pushed the small pile of hot sauce packets toward the end of the lobby counter and placed a stack of photocopies near them. "I do hope those won't leak; I doubt we could press our current relationship with Detective Lockley for fresh copies."

 

"oh, like taco sauce is the grossest stuff we get spattered with." Cordelia retorted as she swept the pile of packets into a drawer already layered in various sauces from local eateries. 

 

"Right then, this is completely out of any rational order. It's as though she simply dumped everything on a photocopier, ah here are her notes, oh very good, with a timeline. Hmm, I didn't think anyone's handwriting could be less legible than Gunn's, but I am proven wrong." "For the time being, until we see the pattern, let's put them in chronological order. Let's see, murder one," He patted the counter, surreptitiously checking for taco leaks. "Ah, the zoo killing. Jackson, Mississippi, a custodial worker was found in a elk cage with the bodies of a lion, the elk, and a banded falcon. "

 

"I've got the photos from eww, that one…oh ew…there's just parts."

 

"No, they are all there, just um, well. Right then, Cordelia, this stack here, please."

 

"Where does the dead horse go, man?"

 

"Hmm, that would be murder two, Shreveport, no, Memphis. Odd, two horse related murders. But no raptors on either. Or lions. Perhaps a blood drinker looking for variety?"

 

Angel shook his head, still looking over Wesley's shoulder, "No, that's about the right amount of blood, unless he only took a mouthful from each." 

 

"And as we all reel from that image … You guys keep making piles. I'm going to get file folders so we can separate these." She pulled out a purple pen and murmured as she wrote, "Shreveport, El Ay, Memphis, Tee En"

 

"Actually, Cordelia, it's Memphis Tee Ex."

 

"As in Texas? Why would anyone name a city in Texas after a city in Tennessee?"

"I would imagine they were both named after the city in Egypt, actually. The next one is Newkirk, New Mexico, and don't forget one for the Jackson Zoo."

 

"Hold your horses, or ew, don't. Is Mississippi Em Ess or is that Missouri?"

 

"Oh really, Cordelia, I can't imagine your educational sys….oh, why don't you go make us some tea?"

 

"Don't be silly Wesley, gimme the photo, I've been working for you guys for how long? I've done autopsy searches before." She glanced down. "Oh, I'm, uh, I'm gonna go make some tea. Or hot chocolate, maybe." She handed the photo to Gunn, who swallowed heavily. "I'm gonna make tea, and then I'll type up labels. Decide what you want them to say." 

 

***

 

"Right then, the police have already determined that the demon is moving, and following an established trail. It seems to follow an east west route, but with variations, so clearly it's not striking simply across country. We'll need to determine the lateral ley lines across the Southern States, perhaps it's following them. Or waterways, perhaps. The timing seems random to the police, but Angel, if you'll pull the almanacs, we'll cross reference moon phases. Hmm, then planetary orbits."

 

"It's not sticking to small or large cities. Or to one gender or even species. "

 

"No, it's not, and some of the sites seem partially concealed, while the city council chamber was horrifyingly open. The only thing they have in common is the writing in chalk."

 

"and those aren't even sensible, I mean, who would an elk call and the city council members were all different religions. They wouldn't worship anyone together."

 

"English, I hate to push you, but we've taken out one demon today, and I'm crashed and let's start fresh in the morning."

 

"He's right Wesley. We can all get some sleep and we'll see what we missed. I'm gone."

 

"I'll be right behind you. See you tomorrow." At the door, Cordelia waved Gunn on and glanced back at the two sitting back to back on the floor, piles of photocopies in a circle around them, since they'd given up on the counter some time before. She shrugged and smiled. Wesley was in his element. In battle, and she'd seen them more often than she wanted to consider, Angel and Gunn seemed almost happy, trading quips and always in motion. Wesley could hold his own, but he didn't share in their violent grace. But here, he was vibrating with energy and one step ahead of all of them. She knew her filing system was incomprehensible to the others and she had to admit to herself that at least part of that was deliberate, but Wesley knew the contents of every reference source he touched, and could find a reference, or a comment, or a footnote, almost immediately. For a moment she wondered what kind of training could create such a talent, then remembering cryptic comments he'd made, decided she really didn't want to know. Turning, she left the demon and the demon hunter to their virtual tracking.

 

* * 

 

"Who loves me? I brought donuts!" Wesley winced at the clatter of Cordelia's shoes as she skipped through the marble lobby and into his office. "You look grumpy and why on earth are you wearing those? They make you look scrawny. Scrawnier. Here. Eat."

 

Wesley glared over his mug, but did take the donut she offered. "I look ridiculous because Angel is far larger than I am and I've managed to run through the clothing I brought over."

 

Gunn reached past her and stole the raspberry filled she'd set aside for herself. "And it's a good thing he stayed, 'cause he figured it out."

 

"No, not really, a detective in Albuquerque made the same assumption, but he was disregarded by his superiors. Wrongfully, I believe, and I can only hope that he will be commended when, hmm, I don't suppose this will ever come to light. Ah well, perhaps I'll simply drop him an anonymous note to tell him he was, in fact…"

 

"Oh god, Wesley, stop obsessing on some guy's ego and just tell me!"

 

"Yes, the killings are based off of imagery in the Revelations of St. John the Divine, so clearly we are looking for a demon playing off the fears of the modern world. Which does narrow the field somewhat; you'd be astonished how many of them refuse to recognize any religion younger than the development of agriculture. So I'm going to be thinking in Greek or Latin most of the day and I would appreciate it if you could, well, let me think. Please. I'm sorry, you truly are a great help, but I need to concentrate. I feel I'm missing something important."

 

Cordelia was deciding whether or not to be offended when the phone rang, and she shut the door before taking two hurried, wasted steps to see Angel pick it up. "Angel Investigations, we hope the helpless, er help the hope…" 

 

"Oh hell," She wrenched it away from him and hissed "you are the hopeless," before speaking clearly and cheerfully into the phone. "Angel Investigations, we, oh hey Kate, yeah, I know. No, he's not sure what it is yet, but I know he's narrowed it down." She paused, then continued in a cooler tone, "More than you would think, actually, especially counting subspecies and clans that go off on their own and sects within species and…well, yeah…right, bye." She looked at the phone "Somebody needs a donut to sweeten her mood. Sheesh."

 

***

Cordelia eyed the last donut and decided that Wesley's hips needed more padding than hers did. She carefully tapped on the door and shoved the donut through like a powdered white flag before she stepped in. Wesley looked up, his hair showing that he'd gone two days without hitting his own bathroom and eyes revealing that he was now on 48 hours with no more than thirty minute naps. "They don't match. I've gone back to the Greek, I've searched in four different… " he slumped until his forehead nearly touched the open book in front of him. "I don't know. The variations are minor, but significant, as though someone were using a different translation than what I have, but I have everything."

 

"Oh piffle, you don't have anything published since 1900 in there and you know it." 

 

Absurdly grateful for the distraction, he glared at her, "as a matter of fact, I do." Still in the bag, but technically in his office was a gag gift for a friend who was retiring to the desert outside Las Vegas. The shiny gold and white 1950's King James had seemed very Liberace to him, and he'd bought it on a whim and simply not mailed it yet. He threw it flat handed to her. "See if you can find something I've missed." Exhausted and admittedly petulant, he allowed his head to drop back to the surprisingly soft surface of the stack of desks. As soft as a pillow, almost, certainly softer than those ghastly camping pillows that….. When he awoke almost three hours later, the books weren't nearly as soft, dust had wormed its way into his eyes, and he'd drooled on a 16th century collection of plates of drawings gathered from the mental asylums in London. It hadn't been particularly helpful, he supposed, but it certainly hadn't deserved such shabby treatment.

 

Giving up on any hope of style, he ran his fingers through his hair and entered the main lobby to be greeted by an arch voice demanding, "why didn't you tell me everything I needed was in this last chapter? Do you know how many times I had to flip back to the index?"

 

"Because I wasn't serious about…Is that a highlighter? You took a highlighter to one of my books?"

 

"No, I took a highlighter to the photocopy I made of one of your books, since Giles threatened … well, I'm not going to give you any ideas, but please believe me when I say I'm never ever going to write in any book ever again. Even a cheap paperback. Okay? Anyway I don't know what you are all uptight about. It's all here. In order, even."

 

"That's impossible. Why would a demon, with thousands of years of history at its claws, be using a seventeeth century colloquial translation of… Oh dear…" He suddenly couldn't trust his knees, and leaned against the wall. "Oh dear"

 

"What? No, don't you dare take your glasses off. What?!"

 

"He's human."

 

**

 

The known killings matched up with Cordelia's yellow highlighter, but since that chapter was full of imagery, much of it bloody, he circled possibilities and, as they had numbered the yellow scenes, labeled what he was calling "Potential scenes" with letters. If he was right, there were other murders that simply hadn't been associated with the case yet. 

 

Grimacing, he picked up the phone, "Det. Lockley, I believe I may have a theory, but if you could, please check for the following: A horse and human found together. We know that the horse will be roan, and there should be a sword involved; it is probably in North Texas, most likely in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Also, please check in Arizona, along Interstate 40 for a pregnant woman. She should be close to term, but I don't know if the child was killed with her. She may have delivered and the child given to authorities. Yes, well, we all cling to irrational hope now and again, I fear…. Yes, thank you."

 

"You didn't tell her the killer was human."

 

"Yes, well, given her treatment of you, I felt it wisest to get all possible information first, before handing it back to her." 

 

***

 

With the new influx of sites, the numbering system was confused, as the police referred to them in chronological order , which threw his notes off. Unable to bring himself to call them by name, he began to use the verse number to denote each murder. If he was correct, and if they hadn't missed one, they had three more tries to stop this man. Wesley leaned back in his chair; he'd seen the end of the world averted, had even attempted to assist in thwarting the Ascension in Sunnydale. This was one person, killing, with the single ghastly exception, one or two people at a time, certainly nothing on the scale of which he normally worked. And yet, and yet, it seemed so very important that this be stopped.

 

***

 

"Right, then," Wesley strode to the cobbled map they'd pinned to the wall. This would be our first killing, May 10, Jackson, Mississippi, a lion, an elk calf, a raptor, which to an uneducated man in a hurry could very well look like an eagle, and a man."

 

"Elk and falcon aren't really calf and eagle."

 

"Yes, but the quote clinches it: ' No one to call come and see.' The local police assumed it was two sentences, but it isn't. He wasn't boasting 'come and see' to the police and indicating that the man couldn't call anyone, he was saying that the heralds of the apocalypse were now unable to call forth the Horsemen with the words, 'Come and see'. It's Chapter 4, verse 7. Well, the first is, obviously each of the…right, on then…. 

 

"The next one is the June 14 Shreveport tourist ranch site. I suspect she was chosen because of her headband. The metallic gold looked like a crown, and she happened to be on a gray horse, which he mistook for white. The words 'who now will purify?' written, again, in white chalk at the scene caught the attention of the local equivalent of Detective Lockley, who does watch for such irregularities and he noted it, thus making it easier to match with the next one, chapter 6, verse five, the burglary and murder in Memphis, Texas on July 1st. The scales found with a body on a black horse and the words "Who now will ride?" should have alerted more people and made the connection obvious, but what no one knew is that there was a related murder to the south on June 19th, in Dallas, or more specifically a suburb of Dallas, at the Las Colinas Equestrian Center, which the police did eventually send us photos of. Part of their reluctance is in regards to this." And he held three photos fanned out toward them. "No chalk, and if it were war, as the red horse would indicate, there should have been a sword. But there was none found. I say none found because if one looks very carefully here, there is a shadow of something long and thin, and in this photo, in the dust of the riding area, clearly something has been dragged away. Someone, for whatever reason, tampered with a murder site and removed a sword of some sort from the body. Dallas' police department has been recently embroiled in an evidence tampering scandal of some sort, and I've no doubt they didn't want to publicize anything further." Kate noted something cryptic on the paper beside her and Cordelia just closed her eyes. Maybe the others could see half shadows in the background, but all she could see was the body of a teenage girl with brown hair pinned in a tidy knot lying with her eyes open and a pool of blood staining her white blouse and beige pants. She looked like Ralph Lauren's screaming nightmare. And she was probably going to ride through Cordelia's nightmares for weeks. 

 

"The Memphis case is where your notes started, so you know as much of this as we do, but I'd like to go over them briefly to keep everything in order. We've not been able to track the chapter 6, verse 9 killing yet, but as it should be simply a man on a pale horse, with no antique scales stolen from a local drugstore to make it unusual, it may be considered an accidental death and not a homicide. I suspect there is a horse and rider somewhere along I40 in NM. We may never know.

 

The street people in Albuquerque on August 20th were formally filed, and the chalked phrase 'They will not testify' was noted in the report, and a New Mexico detective did, in fact, connect the two with the two street prophets mentioned in chapter 11, verse, 13, but he was disregarded by his eminently shortsighted superiors who, I can only hope, will now apologize for…right, yes, well honestly Cordelia, if he'd been given any kind of encouragement, he may well have been able to avert…"

 

Kate interrupted. "He brought it to my attention, Wesley. It's what he could do. I just didn't look into it until it was too late."

 

"Ah well, you couldn't possibly hold yourself responsible for the actions of others. You had no idea of what is going on." He trailed off, all too aware of her skeptical gaze. "Right then, shall we all wallow in guilt for a decade or two, or shall we get on?" Ignoring a muffled "Hey" from the shadows of the room, Wes continued, "August 20th, Albuquerque, yes, followed by the entire city council of Grants, New Mexico, who during their normal public meeting on the first of September, were summoned to convene privately in a secondary chamber, whereupon they were poisoned. Our murderer was clearly in the room and must have had a weapon of some sort to force more than twenty people to drink an assuredly noxious combination of drugs and pesticide samples mixed into wine. And the chalked 'No one to worship', given the variety of religious beliefs of the council members, was bewildering to local law enforcement, but not to, um, to those who were following the events in a less than official capacity."

 

"At which point the case stops being a crackpot and becomes news. Though they were tracking Shreveport, Albuquerque and Grant and couldn't connect the dots with, well, the other dots. Speaking of, I found your pregnant chick, Wes." Cordelia lay her pages out in front of them. "The Flagstaff Police Department. I knew it had to be between September 2nd and October 4th, when the cop was killed, and with Wil —uh, with a little help from a friend, I got this….." 

 

"Cordelia, I pulled this file; it was a suicide, they just couldn't find the gun. She was hiding the pregnancy and couldn't deal with it coming to term. 

 

"Or she couldn't deal with wearing baggy clothes for two more weeks."

 

"Is that a police file? I didn't give you that."

 

"Not important, seriously," she pulled out the highlighter again and swept a circle on the photo, "now tell me what you see."

 

Kate was unconvinced, "A wall full of graffitti. Go back to answering pho.." she paused and squinted. "I gather the pregnant woman in Revelations either goes blind or goes camping?"

 

"Chapter 12 verse 6 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, yadda yadda yadda." Ah yes, that smile, that delightful smile of Cordelia's that reminds them all of the charming girl beneath the snide comments. 

 

"Yes, well, thank you Cordelia, yes, she flees into the wilderness after delivering her son unto God. I don't suppose there was a baby given over to a church or…no… very well. One must hope, I suppose. How utterly abysmal a business this is."

 

"Hate to bust in on the grief fest, but are we near the end, y'all? 'Cause I'm telling you, I'm not liking this campfire story much. Let's skip to the end where we find him and let him have a nice one to one with Saint Pete, eh? Um, I mean, of course, turn him over to the proper authorities."

 

"Right then, Charles. Well, assuming, as I feel safe in doing, that 'She shall not see the wilderness' is in fact a reference to chapter 12, the next one is the one that brought Detective Lockley formally into the police investigation and gave her the company of the two young men currently leafing through Cordelia's fashion magazines. Chapter 13, verse 10, a favorite of all here, is often referred to as 'He that lives by the sword shall die by the sword'; in this case, the translation we've been working from, which may or may not match the one the killer is using…" Kate glared at Angel, who shrugged, while Cordelia leaned forward and struck Wesley sharply on the back of the head "um, right then, here: He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints."

 

"Which is why a Newbury Springs cop was found four days ago folded into his backseat with his throat slit and a local tough in the front seat with his own knife shoved through his trachea."

 

"Um, yes, rather."

 

"Which leaves us where? It's not demonic; as much as I would like to help, there's no way of predicting where he'll strike next or even what he'll do. He attacks in daylight most of the time. This is out of my league."

 

"Not really, we can predict somewhat. In fact, his next victim will be in Napa Valley." Wesley indulged himself with a dramatic pause and read," And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs."

 

Kate pulled out her cell phone and walked out of the hotel for better reception, her watchdogs avoiding her line of sight, but never actually far enough away to keep her from glaring.

 

"Hey Wes, how much blood would that be?"

 

"More than you want to know." 

 

Wesley didn't even glance up; from the cold sorrow in Angel's voice, he didn't particularly want to see his face. "To be realistic, he's been using the imagery rather loosely. I doubt …It doesn't matter anyway, as we are going to stop him before anyone else dies."

 

***

 

He regretted that rash and ultimately false promise later as he called back to the hotel to ask Angel to pick him up on the way to Napa Valley to meet Detective Lockley at the Zingiber Winery. He saw the convertible some distance away and was able to step in as Angel paused at the corner. "Thank you for coming with me; I believe you may be able to help us identify him. He's worn gloves and as most of the sites have been in open or public spaces, the labs have been overwhelmed with trace evidence. I can only hope that you can identify what more traditional methods cannot." 

 

Despite the grim errand, Wesley allowed himself to enjoy the drive. Angel drove, if not cautiously, then without Gunn's disregard for physics and the state of his truck cab space. The top was down and it seemed impossible to not enjoy driving through the Southern California night once they'd gotten past the light pollution of the city. 

 

He found himself humming, then laughed quietly as he recognized the song that Gunn had taken to singing around the hotel. Surprising that any modern movie would have a mix of gospel and blues for a soundtrack, he supposed, though he'd never actually seen either Blues Brothers movie. He sang, softly under his breath, the lead line and to his astonishment, Angel actually followed with the choir's response, no doubt assuming that the moment superceded his limitations as a singer. In a burst of unaccustomed silliness, they belted out John the Revelator until the headlights flashed on the sign for the turn off to the winery. As they pulled off the county road onto a carefully gravelled drive, they could see the red and blue reflections of light in the distance, leading them to a low flat building behind what were obviously the company's main, and tourist, areas. The moment of humor supported them past the first line of the horde of police that always seem to crowd around murder sites, especially macabre ones. Wesley amused himself by spotting the different units of law enforcement eddying about the building until Angel tapped his shoulder and they headed toward Kate, her golden hair shining amidst the county department's traditional brimmed hats. 

 

"There you are. Forensic team is damn near finished, and I don't know what you think you can do, but here's your chance to surprise me. Stay behind me and try not to do anything too odd." 

 

Wesley tried not to gawk; his images of the fine art of winemaking had been unduly colored by legends of the french vinyards and romanticized by the adverts, but the inside of the building looked more like a scaled down refinery than anything else. "I suppose the oak barrels are outdated?" 

 

"No, actually, they aren't. But they are two rooms down. Why? Oh god, is there another body?" Wesley cringed as all movement stilled among the half dozen people still in the room doing arcane things with cotton swabs and strips of tape. 

 

"No, detective, I have no suspicions of another body," he quietly replied. The others in the room read her physical relaxation and returned to their various duties. "I was simply musing. Angel, what's your opinion?"

 

"On wine barrels? Absolutely none." Wesley had to glance up to see a quirk on the other's lips, but Kate chose to ignore them both. Raising his voice so she could hear, Angel continued, "The victim was all over this room, the police have been all over this room, so there's nothing I can pick out near here, but give me a minute …" He paced the perimeter of the room, then motioned them toward a hallway. "What's down here?"

 

"Store rooms..sorry, 'aging' rooms. No windows in there. We've checked for points of entry, but didn't find anything, besides, we know he came in with the last tour group of the day. A Luke Abaddon signed the guest registry. I've spent the last few days memorizing those pages. Even I can recognize that. Why?" 

 

"Because he wears thin latex gloves, and probably does so at all times, or he's carrying an extra pair with him. The smell of latex is…distinct. He's not afraid, is using cheap deodorant soap, with no cologne or aftershave, and his clothes are old and worn enough that they no longer carry a distinctive smell of their own. He sat here, and leaned against this wall," he paused and winced as Kate yelled a name down the hall through which they'd entered, "though with gloves on, he'd leave no fingerprints and there's only local dirt on the carpet. " 

 

Kate cocked an eyebrow at them after directing one of the Q-tip brigade to the shadowed corner. "No dirt at all? She balanced on one foot and checked her own running shoes. "Then his shoes don't have a tread, 'cause I've got mud in here from days ago. Flat bottomed shoes, then. Dress shoes, maybe cowboy boots?"

 

"Hey, I've got a hair." All three were surprised by the cry from the corner. "Of course, it may be one of the workers, but a hunch is good enough to test it for DNA, at least," the young man flashed a smile at Kate, then carefully folded a wide piece of tape over itself, presumably to encase the hair. "Well, some hunches, at any rate."

 

"Nice to know someone still trusts me." Kate called after him, but she did so with a half smile. She shrugged off Wesley's look of inquiry. "If the bloodhound has the scent, I'll walk you back to your car."

 

Out of the immediate earshot of the still milling police, Angel asked, "So how long have you been waiting to make the bloodhound crack?"

 

"Pretty much since Windham-Pryce told me why he wanted to bring you out here." She glanced down at her everpresent notepad, but Wesley spoke before she found the note she wanted.

 

"Chapter 16, the plagues of man."

 

"My first guess would be the CDC, but why would he work his way to L.A, then go back east to Atlanta? "

 

"Where is LA's equivalent disease specialist?" 

 

Kate hit a speed dial number and repeated the query into her cellphone. She clicked it shut. "Figueroa Street - the LA Department of Health Services Acute Communicable Disease Control. Right now they are caught up in this West Nile virus, but that's where all of it is handled. Since September 11, security is up, but they may have dropped it back to normal. How long before he hits there?"

 

"Quite honestly," Wes looked tired as he polished his glasses, "I've no idea. Neither the police nor we have been able to recognize his timing pattern. It may be dictated by an influence we can't access, voices in his head, perhaps. Or it may be that he strikes when he arrives and he's in a cab right now." He replaced the lenses, noting with relief that cleaning them had cut the glare from the still flashing colored lights.

 

"And I'm the only one who would recognize him anyway. We'll go there now. I can at least watch for him while we try to figure a way to establish a stake out."

 

"It's going to be hard; we are in the middle of an established health emergency. I can't shut down that facility without some kind of evidence of a threat. We'll come up with something on the way."

 

**

 

Citing an anonymous source and hinting of the El Al incident gave Kate enough leverage to post two uniforms at the front entrance and upped the level of paranoia about the place. She could only hope it was enough, as parts of the Center ran late into the night, although the main offices followed normal working hours. She and Angel set up a stakeout schedule with two off duty officers joining in. They'd given their first names only and hadn't asked questions, though one of them had cocked an eyebrow at the books that Wesley had in the front seat with him. He assumed that they each had at some point an experience that gave them more faith in Dectective Lockley than in their employer, and the schedule they had set didn't allow for casual conversation.

 

In fact, it happened that Angel and Wes were sitting, anonymous shadows among many across from the center when Angel tapped quickly on the dash. "I may have just caught something. I'm going to make another circuit of the building, watch for me." Silent as always, he moved too quickly to be purely human out of sight as Wesley set aside the booklight and journal he'd been indexing. After four nights of this, he'd grown used to Angel slipping away frequently to check for vague somethings and while he logically appreciated the difficulties of spotting one man's scent in a city full of people, he had grown frustrated at their inability to determine anything more useful about their target. The police sketch artist more than anything proved the unreliability of eyewitnesses. Five people had come into contact with the tour group, but the compiled memory had yielded nothing more useful that a generic picture of a pale young man, nondescript in every way. Blinking to keep from losing focus, he spotted a blur of pale clothing near an employee entrance. He scanned the area hurriedly for Angel, then reluctantly slipped out of the car, drawing an arrow, then setting his notebook on the driver's seat pointing toward the alley, hoping it would be enough of a hint. They really should have worked out some kind of message system, he thought as he crossed the street, trying to keep to the shadows while simultaneously not losing sight of his target. He failed miserably and approached the side entrance with no idea of where his quarry had gone. The door was open and he was absolutely sure that this was a security door that locked itself, so he entered, as quietly as possible. He didn't have time to curse his own stupidity when the pale figure he thought he'd been following stepped with a quiet shuffle into his line of sight and showed itself to be holding a knife large enough to qualify as a sword in some centuries. Thinking he could brazen it out, he dropped his right hand into his jacket pocket and flicked open his cell phone while gesturing strongly enough with his left to cover, he hoped.

 

"What on earth do you think you are doing here?" he asked, trying to strike a balance between speaking loudly enough for Angel to hear and, he admitted bitterly, rush to the rescue and not loudly enough to be obvious about trying to alert others. To his surprise, the man smiled, sadly.

 

"Hoping I'd find someone to help me. That's why you are here, of course. We have to save the world." He turned the lights on and as he was momentarily distracted, Wes hit the speed dial button and the nine, grateful he'd had the foresight to program Lockley's cell phone onto a key he could find by touch alone. "I knew I wouldn't recognize a sickness when I saw it in a doctor's office, but I prayed for someone who would. You are here to tell me which one to use. Come along." 

 

"And if I don't?"

 

"Then you are not the one I need. I'll kill you here and someone else will be here to help me. You cannot stop me. No one can." 

 

Wes leaned against a pale gray wall hoping he looked casual but fearing he was simply doing a bad Jimmy Dean impression. "Then you know what you are doing is wrong," ah, he couldn't deny the irony of actually hoping someone was taping the cell phone conversation, assuming that any of it could be heard through the material of his jacket. He knew, though, that Lockley would at the least see the Caller ID, and Angel was on the grounds, if not in the building by now.

 

"Of course it is, I'm saving the world. I'm disobeying God and protecting everything. I shall be hated by God and the Devil, but I have to… no one else can."

 

"You don't look particularly angelic, or demonic for that matter." He didn't. Wes spared a moment to regret his harsh thoughts toward both the police sketch artist and the winery's employees. The killer really was generic, average heigth, average build, khaki pants much like what Wes himself wore, a faded button down, and dusty wellworn cowboy boots. Even his hair looked faded, somewhere between blonde and light brown, a color that would never find itself on a Clariol bottle. 

 

"I'm not. Not either of them. I'm just me, but I heard the Word and I stepped out of church and I looked around and I saw the puppies and the kids in strollers and I thought, well, that's not right. The end of the world and all. So I'm stoppin' it." He shrugged. 

 

"Let he who hath an ear…"

 

The heavy lidded eyes brightened, "You know me, then. I told you that you were here to help me." He gestured with his free hand. Wesley followed him, walking as slowly as he could without being obvious and making a point of peering into each of the rooms they passed. He was careful to leave the lights on as they passed, though he knew that Angel would need no such trail. Surely the vampire could hear his heartbeat, even from outside the building. Wesley stalled near the front of the building as long as he dared, even stalking through the warren of cubicles where blood was drawn. He'd hoped to find a weapon of some sort, but he doubted that flinging one of the cheap plastic chairs would do more than aggravate him, and he felt quite sure that a man who had made, in his own mind, an enemy of both God and the Devil wouldn't be particularly intimidated by a scholar wielding a rubber strap. The Hallowe'en decorations weren't comforting, as cartoon cats and smiling ghosts fluttered in the artificial air conditioned breeze. 

 

All too soon, they'd moved out of the public areas, past large biohazard signs and 'Employees only' notices, away from cheap carpeting and cold gray paint into tiled floors and even colder white walls. but Wesley hoped they'd have some time still to explore broom closets and administrative offices. He was disappointed to find that the next in the interminable series of unmarked grey metal doors opened to what was clearly a lab. 

 

His companion pushed him forward roughly but not cruelly. "I was startin' to wonder. Too bad you haven't been here before, huh? We could've come right back here." He headed toward the refrigerated cases immediately.

 

He'd hoped to be able to delay a bit longer by searching each of the stations, though they looked uniform enough that it wouldn't have helped much. Perhaps he could have found a bottle of saline and passed that off as the bubonic plague. "How do you know it's in there?" Wes gestured broadly at the case that took up most of one wall.

 

"TV. I watch the 'Who Are You' show. Thursday night. They're smart. They're wrong, but they are sure are smart. I'm not smart," his eyes narrowed with purpose and Wesley felt his hands go cold. "But I'm right." he gestured with the machete, "which one do I need?" 

 

Steeling himself with grim determination, Wes stepped forward. It wasn't a large room, but he noted the location of a heavy lab scope closest to the waiting figure. He knew from experience just how heavy they were, and he mentally marked the divot at the top of the neck under the dirty blonde hair. If he could catch the medulla oblongata with a corner of the scope, the madman would drop. He couldn't spare the time or sympathy to go for a stunning or disabling blow. He simply hadn't the fighting skills to do anything less than his utmost. A twitch at the field of his vision startled him enough to pause, though he kept enough presence of mind not to look directly at it. He stopped at the end of the grey work station, resting his hand on the cold stone surface, and made eye contact with his captor. Months of experience using only his peripheral vision to watch Cordelia around the office came to use as he saw the ceiling tile twitch again. 

 

Earth's supposed savior saw only that his helper had paused. He opened the glass door and pointed at the rows on rows of vials within. "Which of them do I need?" He repeated angrily.

 

"None of them. Get Out," This last was shouted and Wesley presumed directed at him, so he threw himself back toward the still open door only to hear an unexpected cry from Angel. He stuck only his head around the corner of the second rows of workstations to see what looked like steam rising from Angel's chest as he rolled away from the refrigerated case over unforgiving industrial tile. 

 

"No, he's here to help me. You can't stand the cross, so I know what side you are on, but he's here to help me." Wesley lunged to the side, but his attempt to back up the stricken vampire was arrested by the madman's speed and the astonishingly firm grip he used on the collar of Wes's shirt. "The Devil sent you, but I don't follow his call neither. I've turned my back on the Devil and God both."

 

"So that puts me on the side of God? Can I quote you to my lieutenant?" Any relief Wes may have felt at hearing Kate's voice from the hallway was ameliorated by the harsh dig of the knife against his back. "Step away from him, Wesley."

 

"That's not really my decision, Detective." He grimaced as he was spun to be used as a shield. Realizing that this put Angel at his captor's back, he feinted a lunge toward Kate, hoping to force the killer to focus his full attention on keeping him contained. It worked; he saw the shock in the eyes of the policemen behind Kate before he actually felt the pressure on his collar twist and release. He staggered forward, trying not to cough as she smoothly pulled and tossed a pair of handcuffs past him into the room. 

 

***

 

"Crazy madman strength has nothing on pissed off vampire strength, huh?" Cordelia opened her desk drawer to reveal several inches worth of take out packets of hot mustard and duck sauce. She scooped a handful out and plopped them next to the plate of eggrolls she just taken from the microwave. Wesley nodded and sucked on the Icee he'd picked up on the way back to the hotel. It wouldn't really help the bruising at the base of his throat, but he'd used that as the excuse for the treat anyway.

 

"And the LAPD was perfectly content to ignore our presence entirely."

 

"Well, duh. They get the publicity and we get nada." Angel cleared his throat. "Okay, we fight the good fight. Rah rah, go team, yea us. Who do I invoice? St. John the mushroom eater? God? I could send it to Alannis Morrisette, I guess."

 

She was answered 16 days later with a check made out to Angel Investigations paying for the special services of one W. Windham Pryce and assistant. Along with the city issued check was a note from Lockley: "Ch 6 vs 9 was outside of Newkirk, NM. The family considered it another heart attack and assumed scavengers had done the damage, so they didn't file. The local vet insisted on reporting the damage to the horse and made enough of a fuss about poachers with bad aim that the police eventually filed a formal inquiry mid September, but the estimated time of death was the first week of August. It didn't come to me until it had been set to unsolvable in the shared database. Thought you might like to know. Thanks again for your help."

 

"Whole lotta people dead and she says thanks?"

 

"We have no way of knowing who else he might have tried to kill. Even if I had successfully convinced him to take a bottle of saline to poison the world, he might have tried again. And at that we saved one life who will never know she was in danger."

 

"Par for the course." Cordelia started emptying the individual folders into a larger one for storage. "If we do our job right, no one knows we exist." 

 

"You looking for a brass band, girl? Or just a shiny bright award?"

 

"Oh please, where would I put it? Nah, besides, we got a thank you note from Kate. That's gotta be good enough to frame."

 

But two days later as she and Gunn were coming back from the Taco Bueno up the street, he brushed her shoulder and pointed. A California girl, living the cliché of platinum hair and perfect tan, was posing in her inline skates wearing blindingly purple bike shorts and a too tight yellow tee. "D'you think she qualifies as the woman in purple and gold?" Cordelia squeezed Gunn's hand in silent answer and they walked on.


End file.
